Maronite Church
The Maronite Church is an Eastern Catholic sui iuris particular church in full communion with the pope and the worldwide Catholic Church, with self-governance under the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches. The head of the Maronite Church is Patriarch Bechara Boutros al-Rahi, who was elected in March 2011 following the resignation of Patriarch Nasrallah Boutros Sfeir. The seat of the Maronite Patriarchate is in Bkerké, northeast of Beirut, Lebanon. Officially known as the Antiochene Syriac Maronite Church, it is part of Syriac Christianity by liturgy and tradition.
The early development of the Maronite Church can be divided into three periods, from the 4th to the 7th centuries. A congregation movement, with Saint Maron from the Taurus Mountains as an inspirational leader and patron saint, marked the first period. The second began with the establishment of the Monastery of Saint Maroun on the Orontes, built after the Council of Chalcedon to defend the doctrines of the council. This monastery was described as the "greatest monastery" in the region of Syria Secunda, with more than 300 hermitages around it, according to ancient records. After 518, the monastery de facto administered many parishes in Syria Prima, Cole Syria and Phoenicia. The third period was when Sede Vacante followed the Islamic conquest of the region and bishops of the Saint Maron Monastery elected John Maron as Patriarch circa 685 AD, according to Maronite tradition. The Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch reestablished their patriarchate in 751 AD. Other centers of historical importance include Kfarhay, Yanouh, Mayfouq, and the Qadisha Valley.
Although reduced in numbers today, the Maronites remain a principal group in Lebanon, with smaller minorities of Maronites in Syria, Cyprus, Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. Emigration since the 19th century means that about two-thirds of the Maronite Church's roughly 3.5 million members in 2017 were located outside "The Antiochian's Range", where they are part of the worldwide Lebanese diaspora.
History
Origin
, a fourth-century monk and a contemporary and friend of John Chrysostom, left Antioch for the Orontes River in modern-day Syria to lead an ascetic life, following the traditions of Anthony the Great of the Desert and of Pachomius. Many of his followers also lived a monastic lifestyle. According to the tradition of the Maronite Church, Maron is considered the founder of the spiritual and monastic movement that evolved into what is now the Maronite Church. Maronite Christianity has had a profound influence on what is now Lebanon, and to a lesser degree Syria, Jordan and Palestine. Saint Maron spent his life on a mountain in Syria, generally believed to be "Kefar-Nabo" on the mountain of Ol-Yambos in the Taurus Mountains, contemporary Turkey, becoming the cradle of the Maronite movement established in the Monastery of Saint Maron.Following Maron's death in 410 AD, his disciples built the Beth-Maron monastery at Apamea. This formed the nucleus of the Maronite Church. In 452, after the Council of Chalcedon, the monastery was expanded by the Byzantine emperor Marcian.
The Maronite movement reached Lebanon when St. Maron's first disciple, Abraham of Cyrrhus, who was called the "Apostle of Lebanon", set out to convert the non-Christians by introducing them to St. Maron.
The Maronites subscribed to the beliefs of the Council of Chalcedon in 451. Conflicts between Chalcedonian Maronites and Monophysites could become violent. A 517 letter from Chalcedonian Maronites to Pope Hormisdas said Monophysites killed 350 Maronite monks and burned the Monastery of Saint Simeon Stylites in an act of sectarian violence among Christians. Later, Justinian I restored the community. Correspondence concerning the event brought the Maronites papal and orthodox recognition, indicated by a letter from Pope Hormisdas dated 10 February 518. Representatives from Beth-Maron participated in the Constantinople synods of 536 and 553.
An outbreak of civil war during the reign of Emperor Phocas brought forth riots in the cities of Syria and Palestine and incursions by Persian king Khosrow II. In 609, the Patriarch of Antioch, Anastasius II, was killed either at the hands of some soldiers or locals. This left the Maronites without a leader, which continued because of the final Byzantine–Sassanid War of 602–628.
In the aftermath of the war, the emperor Heraclius propagated a new Christological doctrine in an attempt to unify the various Christian churches of the East, who were divided over accepting the Council of Chalcedon. This doctrine, called Monothelitism, held that Christ had two natures but only one will, based on a phrasing of Pope Honorius I, and was meant as a compromise between supporters of Chalcedon, such as the Maronites, and opponents, such as the Jacobites. Monothelitism failed to settle the schism, however, and was declared a heresy at the Sixth Ecumenical Council in 680–681. The Council condemned both Honorius and Patriarch Sergius I of Constantinople but did not explicitly mention the Maronites.
Contemporary Greek and Arab sources suggest the Maronites rejected the Third Council of Constantinople and accepted monothelitism, only moving away from it in the time of the Crusades in order to avoid being branded heretics by the crusaders. The Maronite Church, however, rejects the assertions that the Maronites were ever monothelites and broke communion with Rome; and the question remains a matter of controversy. Elias El-Hāyek attributes much of the confusion to Eutyches of Alexandria, whose Annals El-Hāyek claimed contain erroneous material regarding the early Maronite Church, which was then picked up by William of Tyre and others. Robert W. Crawford concluded the same, pointing out that the heretic "Maro" mentioned in the Annals, which William of Tyre considers as the namesake of the Maronites, was a Nestorian from Edessa and could not have been Maron or John Maron. However, Donald Attwater, a 20th-century historian of Eastern Christianity, affirmed the view that Maronites broke communion with Rome over monothelitism, however briefly.
First Maronite Patriarch
The Patriarch of Antioch Anastasius II died in 609, and Constantinople began to appoint a series of titular patriarchs, who resided in Constantinople. In 685, the Maronites elected Bishop John Maron of Batroun as Patriarch of Antioch and all the East.In 687, as part of an agreements with Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, Byzantine emperor Justinian II sent 12,000 Christian Maronites from Lebanon to Armenia, in exchange for a substantial payment and half the revenues of Cyprus. There they were conscripted as rowers and marines in the Byzantine navy. Additional resettlement efforts allowed Justinian to reinforce naval forces depleted by earlier conflicts.
John Maron established himself in the remote Qadisha Valley in Lebanon. In 694, Justinian sent troops against the Maronites in an unsuccessful attempt to capture the Patriarch. John Maron died in 707 at the Monastery of St. Maron in Lebanon. Around 749 the Maronite community, in the Lebanon mountains, built the Mar-Mama church at Ehden. Meanwhile, caught between the Byzantines and the Arabs, the monastery at Beth-Maron struggled to survive.
Islamic rule
After they came under Arab rule following the Muslim conquest of Syria, Maronite immigration to Lebanon, which had begun some time before, increased, intensifying under the Abbasid caliph al-Ma'mun.To eliminate internal dissent, from 1289 to 1291 Egyptian Mamluk troops descended on Mount Lebanon, destroying forts and monasteries.
Crusades
Following the Muslim conquest of Eastern Christendom outside Anatolia and Europe in the 7th century and after the establishment of secured lines of demarcation between Islamic caliphs and Byzantine emperors, little was heard from the Maronites for 400 years. Secure in their mountain strongholds, the Maronites were contacted in the mountains near Tripoli, Lebanon, by Raymond of Toulouse on his way to conquer Jerusalem in the Great Crusade of 1096–1099. Raymond later returned to besiege Tripoli after the conquest of Jerusalem in 1099, and relations between the Maronites and European Christianity were subsequently reestablished.The Maronites assisted the crusaders and affirmed their affiliation with the Holy See of Rome in 1182. To commemorate their communion, Maronite Patriarch Youseff Al Jirjisi received the crown and staff, marking his patriarchal authority, from Pope Paschal II in 1100 AD. In 1131, Maronite Patriarch Gregorios Al-Halati received letters from Pope Innocent II in which the Papacy recognized the authority of the Patriarchate of Antioch. Patriarch Jeremias II Al-Amshitti became the first Maronite Patriarch to visit Rome when he attended the Fourth Council of the Lateran in 1215. The Patriarchate of Antioch was also represented at the Council of Ferrara-Florence in 1438. Peter Hans Kolvenbach notes, "This contact with the Latin Church enriched the intellectual world of Europe in the Middle Ages. Maronites taught Oriental languages and literature at the universities of Italy and France."
During the Mamluk rule over Lebanon the Maronites were persecuted, with many being killed and others emigrating to Cyprus. Maronite Patriarch Gabriel II of Hjoula was burned alive in 1367 by the Mamluks; and, after a Mamluk campaign against the patriarch residence in Ilig, the patriarchal seat was moved to the Monastery of Our Lady of Qannubin, where it remained until the nineteenth century.
Ottoman rule
In the Ottoman Empire, indigenous concentrated religious communities dealt mainly with the provincial administration. Officially, Maronites had to pay the jizya tax as non-Muslims, but sometimes the monks and clergy were exempt because they were considered to be "poor".Fakhr-al-Din II was a Druze prince and a leader of the Emirate of Chouf District in the governorate of Mount Lebanon. Maronite Abū Nādir al-Khāzin was one of his foremost supporters and served as Fakhr-al-Din's adjutant. Phares notes that "The emirs prospered from the intellectual skills and trading talents of the Maronites, while the Christians gained political protection, autonomy and a local ally against the ever-present threat of direct Ottoman rule." In 1649, Patriarch Yuhanna al-Sufrari placed the Maronites under French protection, and the French opened a consulate in Beirut.
The Khāzin sheikhs subsequently increased in power and influence. In 1662, with the mediation of Jesuit missionaries, Abū Nawfal al-Khāzin was named French consul, despite complaints by Marseille merchants that he was not from Marseille. The Church prospered from the protection and influence of the Khāzins, but at the expense of interference in church affairs, particularly ecclesiastical appointments, which the Khāzins saw as an extension of their political influence.
Bachir Chehab II was the first and last Maronite ruler of the Emirate of Mount Lebanon.
The relationship between the Druze and Christians has been characterized by harmony and peaceful coexistence, with amicable relations between the two groups prevailing throughout history, with the exception of some periods, including 1860 Mount Lebanon civil war.
The Maronite Catholics and the Druze founded modern Lebanon in the early eighteenth century, through a governing and social system known as the "Maronite–Druze dualism" in the Mount Lebanon Mutasarrifate.